Families

 It seemed to us that the scenery improved almost as soon as we crossed the border from Kansas to Oklahoma.

 Ted grew up in Bixby, Oklahoma, a small town that was, at the time, about 17 miles southeast of Tulsa.  Today, you can't tell where Tulsa ends and Bixby begins.

 Ted's grandfather had a restaurant in the two story gray building in the early 1900s.  Much of his family still lives near-by.  The red building just down the block is the home of a cousin and her husband.

 Our friends Walt and Cleone (whom Ted has known since he was in the third grade) own this building.  They are also avid RVers, and generously built this slab with complete RV service for the convenience of their visiting RV friends.  We thoroughly enjoy their company.  The "Happy Hours" with them while we were here were a real treat. 

Ted and Penny traveled with Ted's cousin Colleen (second from the left) to Oklahoma City to visit with yet more cousins: Larry and his wife Michele, and Larry's parents Dee and Dorothy.  Sorry about the Thunder, Michele, we were pulling for them, too.

Bixby is a neat town, and is in a pretty area of Oklahoma, but it was warmer than these two wimpy North-westerners are accustomed to any more.  Our coach air conditioners ran the entire time we were there.  The sunsets through Walt and Cleone's trees were, however, beautiful. 

From Oklahoma, we drove to Illinois for a reunion with Penny's family.  We both enjoyed ourselves.  Here, we are gathered at Jim and Lettie's lovely log house on a hill looking down into the historic Sangamon River, not far from Springfield, and even closer to Petersburg, Illinois, once home to Ann Rutledge, Abraham Lincoln, and Edgar Lee Masters, author of Spoon River Anthology.  The latter two are buried there.  The history of this area makes it a must visit.  We visited the Lincoln Museum for the second time with several cousins.  It is an amazing presentation of Lincoln's life.

We are very fortunate to have families that we both enjoy and appreciate.  It makes visits with them something we both look forward to.